Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Best school sponsored math enrichment programs?

Hi…We are looking to improve math in our K-5 school and are allowed to complement the curriculum with enrichment activities before/after/during school. What activities/programs do you think are especially good for math focused g&t kids? We are especially interested in multi-age programs. Thanks!

Math competitions (and school "math club" prep for them) are staples at many schools. While some competitions are for middle school and high school students, Math League, Mathcounts, and Olympiad are among those which begin within the K-5 range. Many math resources including competitions and books introducing various math concepts are listed on the Davidson database: http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/browse_resources_136.aspx

I agree that math competition club is probably the best for directly helping with math.

You could also do some peripheral programs that compliment math problem solving such as chess, logic games, easy programming (Lego League).

Be sure to include activities that do not involve competition. Not all kids like to compete, though they do like to play and participate. I'm glad you are planning on multi-ages. Our high school math team assigns the type of math by grade, so you won't compete in calculus, for example, until you are a junior, even if you have studied it.

I think Junior First Lego League might cast a wider net. http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprograms/jr.fll

Also, I'd make sure that some math-oriented websites are available for kids who want to explore and practice in different areas at their own pace.

I've been brainstorming ways to have a math club focused on fun rather than competitions, done right it might bring in more kids as even kids who are great at math are not necessarily interested in just doing math or competitions without a nudge. My DS8 is nuts about math, but other kids in his GT class just see it as another school subject.

Some of these ideas: Fun math and science videos, game programming (or just Scratch), a kid ran math and science video show, a business simulation club.

I like the idea of offering non-competition options as well as competition. This might make the club more appealing to girls, some of whom may feel turned off by competition. I think it is really important to work on making sure the club is inclusive that way. You could also integrate art activities that are math-oriented. My DD10 is fascinated by Vi Hart's math doodle videos on YouTube. Appealing posters with cool art from those videos could draw in a broader audience. I also like the Lego robotics (although this can be expensive) and the coding idea. I would emphasize that there would be fun, hands-on activities. My DD did not want to do the math league at her school because she perceived it as boring, pencil and paper work, yet she loved the engineering night held by a local university's engineering dept and excelled at the activities.

Noetic Learning is a great way to include multi-age kids.
Do check it out. I bet it has everything you would want to get a great start.

They have 2 contest fall and spring. They post results and give National Honor Roll and Honorable Mention awards. And medals to perfect scores. Check out the contest page you can view the info/results from there.


http://www.noetic-learning.com

Our K-4 schools offer family math nights and a Math 24 club. Fourth graders have the opportunity to compete in local Challenge 24 competitions.

I run math enrichment programs in our 5-6 grade elementary school, Middle School, and High School. We offer many non-competitive activities, but they don't have a huge or long term impact on student learning. By far competitions have the greatest impact on growth (including for girls) and offer the best challenges for gifted students.

Here's our website. Feel free to PM me or contact me through the site if you have questions about our programs.

That's a very interesting comment. Can you pinpoint what exactly it is about it that has the greatest impact on growth?

I was interested in this comment as well and would like to see the research it is based on. (Sorry--that sounds combative! I don't mean it as such. Genuinely curious.)

I would not be surprised if competitions offer good challenge and learning for gifted students who attend and study them...but I wonder what methods have the best success at recruiting and REACHING students? For instance, I feel pretty confident that DD is mildly/moderately gifted in math, but if she never comes to math club she won't experience ANY growth from math club, of course.

I am not anti-competition, because I think it's a great outlet for kids who are into that. But I wonder if it could be done sort of like how my kids' school does chess: there are the kids who compete and the the broader group of kids there for fun. The competition kids come to the big club, but also meet separately...and sometimes kids who didn't at first show promise develop it and get recruited for competition.